Miiverse Shutdown: Nintendo Gives Instructions On How To Download Post History

It’s the end of the road for Nintendo’s attempt at providing a social network space for Wii U and 3DS users. The Japanese consumer electronics and video games company has apparently retired Miiverse. So from now on, users who will try accessing the service via their gaming devices will be presented with a 115-5004 error code.

On Wednesday, Nintendo updated the official Miiverse site with a farewell message to users. Those who will load the site will be greeted with the message: “Thank you to everyone who used Miiverse! Miiverse service has ended as of 11/8/2017.” Nintendo has also prepared a special “Thank You” mosaic that was created using handwritten posts from users for visitors to see.

While it is quite sad for users to bid the service goodbye, Nintendo has made sure that Miiverse users have the option of downloading all of their posts. The company shared the instructions on how to gain access to one’s downloadable post history. According to Nintendo, they will be sending users email notifications that include the URL to their downloadable post history.

The company has indicated that the email notification will be sent to the email address users registered to their Nintendo Account and not the one they used to register to their Nintendo Network ID. Nintendo warns that it may take a few weeks before users can receive the email notifications, so they should be patient.

Miiverse was launched in late 2012. It was originally intended for the Wii U, but it was later on introduced to the 3DS. The service was specially designed to promote interactions among the members of the gaming community. According to Kotaku, Miiverse served as a place where players could hang out and share things like hand-drawn pictures and screenshots.

One of the main reasons why Miiverse was terminated had to do with the rise of other social networking platforms. Nintendo has alluded to this when it said, “We decided to end the service at this time because, among other reasons, many users are shifting to social networking services.”

The Next Web says that even though Nintendo has succeeded in creating a family-friendly, cartoony social space for its console players, the Miiverse just had little chances of competing long-term against the likes of Facebook, Twitter and other social-networking platforms that do more than just offering a tiny scribbling space for gamers.

Meanwhile, Nintendo Enthusiast opines that Miiverse was mainly shut down for it was not bringing money to Nintendo. As a completely free service, Miiverse did not provide any opportunity for the company to gain money out of it. It did not have support for ad placements, so it technically brought nothing to the company. Moreover, everyone’s attention has shifted to the Switch ever since the hybrid console was launched. This translates to the reduced number of Wii U and 3DS users.

Nintendo already gave users a heads-up about the termination of Miiverse in late August, as per Polygon. The company at the time revealed that the service will be terminated on Nov. 8 at 1.am. ET. Prior the announcement, users already had an idea about the shutdown for dataminers discovered a text suggesting that the Miiverse was coming to a conclusion this November.